Reviewing some files this past week. Children's files. Actual people. I do not know why this feels so weird, but it does. Looking at kids' histories and pictures, weighing needs and potentialities, trying to get a feel for the long term.
But these aren't used cars, they're kids. This is part of the process, no matter how you approach it. At some point, someone is going to make you nail down what you are willing to deal with. What you believe you are capable of handling. And this part, to me anyway, is ugly.
Not, let me be clear, because of the kids. The kids inspire nothing in me but compassion. A tearing, anxious compassion that wants to sweep them all into my embrace and volunteer to raise everyone, Every. Last. One.
The ugly part is what this process exposes in me. It lays bare all my pettiness, my insecurities, the things that pollute my heart. The part of me that wonders if I can handle a child with a very visible need, a need that may never be totally fixable. Club feet are ugly, but fixable to the point that you'd never know they were there. Heart conditions are often fixable, the scar hidden unless you go to the pool, where I have it on good authority that a truly wicked scar is not actually a handicap. But what about the more obvious things? Missing fingers? Limbs? A pronounced limp? I don't know. I am trying to feel this out, imagine myself with a child like this. Imagine being even more conspicuous as a family than we would be anyway with an Asian child.
I am unsure. Not rejecting outright, you understand, just unsure. And anxious.
It's just that I have always taken my children's physical health for granted. I have never wondered whether they would be able to play any sport they felt like trying. Never worried that others might make fun of them for the way they walk. Never contemplated the stares, the possibly rude and intrusive questions or comments that might arise. Never ever, not once, had to consider how I would help my child cope with all these things.
And now I am being called to do this. And it is hard.
And the craven, cowardly part of me wants to bury my head in the sand and say "no way, God. This...this is more than I can do. I am not actually this big of a person. Look at me, Lord!...I am very shallow and small and weak. I don't tolerate embarassment well, I mostly like people to not notice me, I have a deeply private streak in me that really resents intrusion. I am not the one for this job."
But if I'm not the one for this job, then who is?
And let me add this little tidbit: two nights ago these children invaded my dreams. And in my dream I was chasing a child. Not just any child, but one of the little boys we are considering. One who is so darling, and yet whose needs cause some anxiety (see? -- more anxiety. It's a theme). In the dream, he was walking along the sidewalk and he turned and this deep, booming voice (not my voice) said "He's perfect." And some other part of me, the watching part, agreed -- "perfect."
Whaddaya think? Voice of God? Might be. I don't discount these things lightly.
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
Full Plate
The musical is over and I thought my week would relax a bit, but the crazy, hot mess that is my life continues to steamroll ahead, dragging me along with it.
Gack. I am so tired of feeling one step behind myself.
All conversations with my better half are on the fly. A maximum of 5 minutes, sometimes quite intense but always very short, is what we've been reduced to. He managed to pick a fight with me at bedtime last night, so that took care of any pillow talk.
Stony silence ensued.
I hate it when we are like this. I always feel like part of me has been severed, or has ceased functioning. Like having an arm you can see, but can't get to work. I suppose this is a good trait if you're going to be in a marriage, this very low tolerance for disharmony.
Ultimately, I think this is what Satan wants -- discord in the body, any part of the body. It all contributes to breakdown, to misunderstanding, to entropy. We get so bogged down in our petty crap, we stop moving forward, stop praying, stop looking out and turn our eyes on our own junk which is naturally so much more important than anyone else's critical issues.
And I move so slowly anyway, for heaven's sake. I'm not what you'd call a barnburner. I have to think, and meditate, and consider, and rethink. So today I am even slower than my normal slow crawl.
Unfortunately, today has a lot of demands that are going to require a little more zip than "slow crawl."
Sigh.
Gack. I am so tired of feeling one step behind myself.
All conversations with my better half are on the fly. A maximum of 5 minutes, sometimes quite intense but always very short, is what we've been reduced to. He managed to pick a fight with me at bedtime last night, so that took care of any pillow talk.
Stony silence ensued.
I hate it when we are like this. I always feel like part of me has been severed, or has ceased functioning. Like having an arm you can see, but can't get to work. I suppose this is a good trait if you're going to be in a marriage, this very low tolerance for disharmony.
Ultimately, I think this is what Satan wants -- discord in the body, any part of the body. It all contributes to breakdown, to misunderstanding, to entropy. We get so bogged down in our petty crap, we stop moving forward, stop praying, stop looking out and turn our eyes on our own junk which is naturally so much more important than anyone else's critical issues.
And I move so slowly anyway, for heaven's sake. I'm not what you'd call a barnburner. I have to think, and meditate, and consider, and rethink. So today I am even slower than my normal slow crawl.
Unfortunately, today has a lot of demands that are going to require a little more zip than "slow crawl."
Sigh.
Friday, April 13, 2012
A Night and a Day
Bad night, really. Fell asleep but woke up 1.5 hours later and couldn't turn off the brain. Staggered downstairs to have my mild panic attack without disturbing Tim. Staggered back upstairs an hour later, sure that I could now rest, and spent the next half hour telling myself to relax everytime my shoulders tensed up. Finally asleep by 2 or so. Tim woke me at 5:40 for who knows what reason. Awake another 1/2 hour. Maggie bounced in at 7. Even with a LARGE cup of coffee, I still feel a little groggy.
Weather is not helping today -- it's so cloudy, even with all the lights on it feels a little like I'm underwater. So much to do, more errands to run, places to go. No desire to go anywhere at all. No time to TALK with my husband, just talk. Am seriously thinking of hiring a babysitter for Saturday night so I can have time alone with Tim.
Some kind of virus is messing with me, but not enough for me to curl up in bed and be truly sick. Just enough to make everything more of an effort than usual. And to make frequent swallowing both necessary and unpleasant. Really trying to get on top of the cleaning, but just found out that my dad co-opted my husband's time tomorrow (cleaning day) and the really awful trouble spots (which are his) will probably not get cleaned.
Troubled in a vague way by the multitude of undone projects around the house. From where I sit, I can see two of them. Three more (mostly painting) are waiting for completion upstairs. Bleah. Stunning what an absence of sun and a lousy night's sleep will do to me. I think a little more coffee is in order, but this is always a deal with the devil. I will feel better for a little while, but the crash will be spectacular.
Is it wrong to want to just curl up with a book and ignore everything?
Weather is not helping today -- it's so cloudy, even with all the lights on it feels a little like I'm underwater. So much to do, more errands to run, places to go. No desire to go anywhere at all. No time to TALK with my husband, just talk. Am seriously thinking of hiring a babysitter for Saturday night so I can have time alone with Tim.
Some kind of virus is messing with me, but not enough for me to curl up in bed and be truly sick. Just enough to make everything more of an effort than usual. And to make frequent swallowing both necessary and unpleasant. Really trying to get on top of the cleaning, but just found out that my dad co-opted my husband's time tomorrow (cleaning day) and the really awful trouble spots (which are his) will probably not get cleaned.
Troubled in a vague way by the multitude of undone projects around the house. From where I sit, I can see two of them. Three more (mostly painting) are waiting for completion upstairs. Bleah. Stunning what an absence of sun and a lousy night's sleep will do to me. I think a little more coffee is in order, but this is always a deal with the devil. I will feel better for a little while, but the crash will be spectacular.
Is it wrong to want to just curl up with a book and ignore everything?
Tuesday, April 10, 2012
Swamped
I am drowning in kids' activities this month. This week alone, I have 7 separate scheduled activities for my children. If you add in allergy shots and a costume fitting which positively must take place, the total rises to 9. We have had one day -- one short, blessed evening -- with no activities. That was yesterday. Today I fully anticipate some sort of implosion around 6 pm. That will be my head, caving in from all the pressure of trying to be 3 places at once.
In the midst of all this chaos -- and let me tell you, next week is looking even hairier than this one -- we are trying to pull our heads together to get this adoption ball rolling. But there is hardly a spare minute in the day to really talk about it, so I am faced with the prospect of acting unilaterally or not acting at all.
I am finding it hard (understatement) to make these decisions by myself. The two biggies we have to deal with immediately are a) which agency? and b) which special needs?
These are not small issues.
The agency decision is tough -- it's hard to get a 'feel' for an agency over the Internet or even in phone conversation with someone. I've read surveys, haunted web groups, stalked various adopter's blogs, but I still don't feel a pull toward any particular agency. Since this is kind of fundamental to the process, we kind of need to get on it. Tim is of no help in this area at all. His response? "You've done the research, just make a decision."
Um, what?
The second big deal is going through the list of special needs we would be willing to consider. This is just daunting. There's really no other word for it. It's one thing to look at kids and another thing to look at labels. Labels are way scarier. And while it's responsible to Google these things to get a bead on what they are, the information that throws up ranges from nerve-wracking to earth-shattering, in about equal measure. It all boils down to this: nearly every need could be no big deal or a Very Big Deal Indeed. It all depends. So confronting this list of needs is a mind blower. My knee-jerk reaction is "none of them -- they're all more than I can cope with." I think about things like how well I would deal with a lot of needles and blood and procedures. Could I handle surgeries? Is it in me to deal with something long-term -- maybe forever-long-term? I just don't know.
This is where the rubber meets the road. Because living for Christ means I have to die to me. And my secret identity? -- is Much Afraid. Much Afraid doesn't think she can do anything. She has a very narrow range of what she feels she can handle and she is so busy burying her head in the sand that she can't see her savior's hand held out to her, beckoning her into the wider world (or rather, she is pretending not to see it). All Much Afraid ever wanted was to be married, to be a mom, to have a house and a little garden. She would have these things and live happily ever after, the end. But then Jesus started messing with her heart. He was so subtle about it -- a news story way back in the early '90s about abandoned babies in China; a flyer in a church bulletin about adoption in 2000; a little difficulty getting pregnant with #1 -- just enough to make adopting a definite option; a Steven Curtis Chapman concert in 2005; a giant billboard right on the way to preschool where she had to see it every single day for 8 months; sobering statistics that floated in from who-knows-where about children alone, in need of families; a little boy's face on a waiting child list a few years ago; the desperate need for families for boys just because they're boys. And now she's here, unable to turn away from the reality that is the orphan crisis, knowing that this is the path to take, but shaking in her shoes nonetheless.
The thing is, Much Afraid is still fearful. She is mostly fearful of making a mistake, especially as she begins this whole process. What if I choose the wrong agency? What if we say yes to a need that's more than we can handle? What if we are referred a child and we don't like him? (don't judge -- just keepin' it real). What if ....what if...what if. What if God doesn't show up? What if He drops the ball on this one and we are left hanging out to dry?
Let's let God work, my husband says. Let's do this and let him bless us in ways we would never see if we didn't step out in faith. Let's go, and let him undertake.
What this means, really, is take a step. Letting go, right now, means taking a step forward. Don't sit still, don't hide, don't choke, don't throw it into reverse. Go forward. The hand is held out to you. Take it.
Just take it.
In the midst of all this chaos -- and let me tell you, next week is looking even hairier than this one -- we are trying to pull our heads together to get this adoption ball rolling. But there is hardly a spare minute in the day to really talk about it, so I am faced with the prospect of acting unilaterally or not acting at all.
I am finding it hard (understatement) to make these decisions by myself. The two biggies we have to deal with immediately are a) which agency? and b) which special needs?
These are not small issues.
The agency decision is tough -- it's hard to get a 'feel' for an agency over the Internet or even in phone conversation with someone. I've read surveys, haunted web groups, stalked various adopter's blogs, but I still don't feel a pull toward any particular agency. Since this is kind of fundamental to the process, we kind of need to get on it. Tim is of no help in this area at all. His response? "You've done the research, just make a decision."
Um, what?
The second big deal is going through the list of special needs we would be willing to consider. This is just daunting. There's really no other word for it. It's one thing to look at kids and another thing to look at labels. Labels are way scarier. And while it's responsible to Google these things to get a bead on what they are, the information that throws up ranges from nerve-wracking to earth-shattering, in about equal measure. It all boils down to this: nearly every need could be no big deal or a Very Big Deal Indeed. It all depends. So confronting this list of needs is a mind blower. My knee-jerk reaction is "none of them -- they're all more than I can cope with." I think about things like how well I would deal with a lot of needles and blood and procedures. Could I handle surgeries? Is it in me to deal with something long-term -- maybe forever-long-term? I just don't know.
This is where the rubber meets the road. Because living for Christ means I have to die to me. And my secret identity? -- is Much Afraid. Much Afraid doesn't think she can do anything. She has a very narrow range of what she feels she can handle and she is so busy burying her head in the sand that she can't see her savior's hand held out to her, beckoning her into the wider world (or rather, she is pretending not to see it). All Much Afraid ever wanted was to be married, to be a mom, to have a house and a little garden. She would have these things and live happily ever after, the end. But then Jesus started messing with her heart. He was so subtle about it -- a news story way back in the early '90s about abandoned babies in China; a flyer in a church bulletin about adoption in 2000; a little difficulty getting pregnant with #1 -- just enough to make adopting a definite option; a Steven Curtis Chapman concert in 2005; a giant billboard right on the way to preschool where she had to see it every single day for 8 months; sobering statistics that floated in from who-knows-where about children alone, in need of families; a little boy's face on a waiting child list a few years ago; the desperate need for families for boys just because they're boys. And now she's here, unable to turn away from the reality that is the orphan crisis, knowing that this is the path to take, but shaking in her shoes nonetheless.
The thing is, Much Afraid is still fearful. She is mostly fearful of making a mistake, especially as she begins this whole process. What if I choose the wrong agency? What if we say yes to a need that's more than we can handle? What if we are referred a child and we don't like him? (don't judge -- just keepin' it real). What if ....what if...what if. What if God doesn't show up? What if He drops the ball on this one and we are left hanging out to dry?
Let's let God work, my husband says. Let's do this and let him bless us in ways we would never see if we didn't step out in faith. Let's go, and let him undertake.
What this means, really, is take a step. Letting go, right now, means taking a step forward. Don't sit still, don't hide, don't choke, don't throw it into reverse. Go forward. The hand is held out to you. Take it.
Just take it.
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